// G&L parenting in the heart of Europe

The Family Reunion brochure is being published as a part of the Family Reunion project focusing on mapping the theme of gay and lesbian parenting in Central Europe. The authentic interviews accompanied by illustrative photographs by selected artists were gathered in the second half of 2005 in the Czech and Slovak Republics, Slovenia, Hungary and Poland. In order to secure anonymity to the gay and lesbian parents who took part in the project, their names had to be changed; for the same reason, full names of the writers of the interviews are not stated in full.

• Czech: Happy alternative (Katerina, Alzbeta & Honzik)
  "There are families where there is a mother and three kids, where there is a father and nobody – this is exceptional. And then there are families where there are no kids. And there are families where parents don't get married. I think that this creates variety and nobody can be really harmed."
   
   
• Slovene: These things happen (Bojan, Ulrich & Matej)
  "It is an incredible responsibility. Absolutely! When he goes to school in the morning, I keep asking myself: has he got on the right bus, what if he's hit by a car or forgets the keys? I couldn't understand how Bojan could be so calm. Then once he told me: 'Otherwise, I would be completely mad and my hair would turn grey!'"
   
• Slovak: We are simply living in it (Anna, Helena, Kacenka & Zuzanka)
  "Our great advantage compared with the traditional model is that we are always close to each other, ready to help. So when Anna says she can't do something or when I need help, the traditional model would probably not work. A man would usually say something like: 'why should I do this?'"
   
   
• Polish: Sometimes we were just surprised (Olga, Jolanta & Krzysztof)
  "I was really worried at first, I could see my friends who got married and found it hard to cope with their maternity. Jolanta would talk about it more and more and I felt she really wanted the baby and so I actually had no other choice. I didn't understand the strength of her desire very much, she was ready to give up her life, we were travelling quite a lot by then because you could hardly breathe in Poland at that time. I tried to present all possible disadvantages but Jolanta was really determined by then."
   
• Hungarian: We must trust each other at 100% (Zsuzsana, Beata, Ildiko & Gabor)
  "This is associated with my idea of a certain handicap of gay and lesbian couples, our position is terribly disadvantageous. We simply need to trust each other much more. We must trust each other at 100% because no law or regulation will help us."
  

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